My Brother's Shadow
by Redrose001
Summary: Mycroft has always been jealous of his little brother, but those feelings are soon are gone when Mycroft switches off his emotions. Sherlock plays quite a large role in his brother's life and it is not always positive. As Mycroft looks back on his memories, he looks back on his struggles with his emotions and how his relationship with his brother.


I do not own Sherlock and all rights belong to the BBC.

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Mycroft liked being mummy's favorite; he rather enjoyed all the attention he got. Whatever he wanted Mummy would give him it with knobs on top. For the first seven years of his life, he would describe them as the best years of his life mostly as he didn't have his little brother. He asked for a little brother for his birthday when he was six, in hopes that he would be able to have someone to boss about and to pass some of his wisdom on to in hopes that his brother would be as smart as him. Instead of a nice caring brother, he got Sherlock.

It wasn't that he didn't like his brother, in fact that he cared about him a great deal. The main thing that he had against his brother was that his brother tended to do some rather stupid things and they gave him all of their parent's attention. When Mycroft would get full marks in a maths test, Sherlock would have fallen down the stairs and needed to go to hospital. Mycroft knew that his brother's health was important but his math test was important to him, he had given up the weekend to study for it and he had even refused cake to study, and then it was put in second place because of Sherlock almost dying. By the end of the day Sherlock had come home with a sprained wrist and was pampered by Mummy for the rest of the night. Mycroft tried to mention his maths results and he hoped that Mummy would tell him that he was a clever boy and she would cut him a bit of cake, instead she only half listened and quickly went to Sherlock with a slice of cake and his pirate book that she would later read to him. When Father came home, Mycroft ran up to tell him the results of his test, as he knew that Father would be proud of him being at the top of the class again. Every time he would get top marks, Father would take him to the parliament and they would watch a debate. Instead of congratulating Mycroft, Father went into the living room and started to play his violin for Sherlock. Mycroft was basically ignored for the rest of the night apart from one time when Mummy asked him to stop sulking. Later that night Mycroft went up to bed and thought of many ways he could be better than his brother and stop being in his shadow.

When Mycroft was twelve he started private school. Mycroft didn't really like school mostly as he was away from his parent's and he didn't have many friends due to the fact that he thought that most people were idiots and the boys he talked to was so that he could build his 'network' of people and use them later in life. Every Friday the school would have a rugby match and most of the school would be their mostly so they could show the competing school, how private education was better. Instead of going to the rugby game, Mycroft would study and he hoped that Mummy would be proud of him for getting good marks and think that he was the better child.

Every Sunday he would phone Mummy and tell her what happened during that week at school. Mummy would tell him that he was going far places when he was older and how father was happy when he heard about Mycroft's 'network'. Mycroft would always ask about his brother, mostly out of politeness and because he did miss his brother though he hated to admit it. The rest of the phone call would be Mummy gushing over Sherlock's achievements of managing to speak in fluent French at age six and how he managed to do another big experiment with his first chemistry set or how he could play another complicated piece of music on the violin that he got for Christmas. After seven tedious minutes of Mummy talking over Sherlock, Mycroft would claim it was time for bed even though curfew was not for another two hours. Each phone call made him feel even more unloved from Mummy, all he wanted for her to tell him that she was proud of him but before she could do so, Sherlock would have done something that stole of Mummy's attention from him. Once again.

The only time he could remember Mummy being proud of him and not his brother, was when he managed to get his first job in the government when he first left university at age nineteen. It was just a simple office job and he was one of the worker's assistant. He would have to the most boring jobs such as typing and fetching cups of coffee. It wasn't the best job but it was a start to working in the government. Mycroft though by the time his boss eventually retired, he would be able to get his job as having a minor spot in the British government that held a lot of power to it. So until his boss retired, Mycroft would need to work hard to try and move up the employment ladder. He absolutely hated his job, mostly due to the fact that it was rather simple and it not very challenging, but Mycroft knew that Mummy being proud of him was worth all the boredom.

Once his boss retired, Mycroft managed to get the minor job in the government that he desired after working hard for six years. Mummy was so proud of him and it was deftly worth all the work, and he would do all it all again just so he see Mummy's face again when he told her that he got the job. When hearing the news about his position Father gave him his grandfather's old umbrella. As a child Mycroft adored his grandfather and other than his mother, he would count his grandfather as his second favorite person in the world. Mycroft would visit his grandfather every Sunday on his own mostly as Sherlock would refused to visit mostly as he had better things to do other than visit an old man, but Mycroft didn't care that his brother didn't come with him as it meant that he got all the attention for once.

The visits would consist of having tea in the parlour and once tea was finished, Mycroft would polish Grandfather's silver and he and Grandfather would talk about anything and everything. The moment that he would tell Grandfather about getting top marks in the class or winning a prize, Grandfather would smile and would give him a hug and tell Mycroft that he was very proud of him and tell him how he was being a 'proper Holmes man.' Grandfather was the only person who Mycroft would accept hugs from. The moment that Grandfather died, the hugs stopped.

When Mycroft heard that Grandfather died, his whole world ended. Father took him and Sherlock to his office and sat him down and told him the news about Grandfather. With every word Father said, Mycroft felt his world slowly start to crumble like an old building. Sherlock on the other hand, looked if he couldn't care less and acted if the death of a relative was a major inconvenience to him. Once Father had finished talking to them, he sent them out of his office so he could sort out funeral arrangements. As they walked out of Father's office, Sherlock kept complaining about how Grandfather's funeral was a waste of his time as it meant that he would have to cancel his experiment for another day. Mycroft put on his expressionless face and acted if he didn't care about what happened. But as he and Sherlock walked through the empty halls of the house, Sherlock kept complaining about how Grandfather was being selfish for dying and how he always hated Sherlock so that's why he decided to die on the day Sherlock was doing his experiment. Mycroft ended up shouting and screaming at Sherlock and ended up punching him in the face. It wasn't the nicest thing to do, but Mycroft couldn't stand his brother disrespecting his grandfather. After punching his brother Mycroft walked calmly to his room as if nothing happened and didn't leave for three days. When he did eventually leave his bedroom, Mycroft was a changed person.

As a child Mycroft was never one for showing his emotions, as he thought that they were a weakness, so when the situation got heated and it Mycroft felt his emotions start to get the better of him, he would put on his best 'stone face' and he would send a few insults in the other person's direction and leave the situation while the other person was madly in shock from Mycroft 's last comments. Mycroft thought that caring about things was slowing him down and wasn't going to help him in later life as it would hold him back. Mycroft read books on the topics of psychology to help him to stop caring about things, after many countless hours of poring over the books, he couldn't find an answer. Instead of teaching him not to care, instead they taught the topics of love and caring, even how people could die from a broken heart. After reading that, Mycroft decided that he wasn't going to die from caring too much, he remembered how sad his Grandfather looked when Grandmother died. For months he could remember his Grandfather sitting on Grandmother's chair holding the wedding photo. Mycroft didn't understand why his Grandfather would be upset about his Grandmother dying. People died all the time, so why would a death of one person effect someone so much? He couldn't remember much about Grandmother, all he could remember of her was that she smelt strongly of soap and peanuts and she would read Jane Austin novels all the time. Other than that he couldn't recall anything else about her, when he visited Grandmother would be reading something or she would be watching silently from a corner as Grandfather would show his umbrella collection to him and Sherlock would be watching a spider spinning its silvery web in the dark space between the china cabinet and the wall. After seeing how the death of Grandmother affected his Grandfather, Mycroft decided that caring about people was going to be the end of him and he didn't want to be like his Grandfather, growing older by the minute as he stared at a past memory and try to relive it.

Mycroft was proud of himself once he had managed to switch off his emotions. But like most masks, even though they can hide the identity of the wearer, you can still see them. Not in a big way as if they had a big flashing sign above their head screaming the words 'I care about things!' instead they just show little glimpses of the truth and that is through the eyes. They do say that the eyes are the windows to the soul, Mycroft thought that it was a stupid expression, but he wondered how he could stop his eyes showing how he felt. So many a time when he first put on the mask, Sherlock would ask him why his eyes would look sad. Mycroft would tell him to go away and to stop saying stupid things. But when he was alone, he would look in the mirror and look at his eyes. Sherlock was right. They did look sad.

Sherlock was the chink in Mycroft's armor, he had always been and he would always be. Mycroft used to envy his brother and even though he hated to admit it, he still did. When he was younger he would envy all the attention his brother got from their parents. As Sherlock got older, Mycroft tried to teach his brother the art of not caring. Sherlock managed to learn the trade quickly, however he had the flaw of having a caring heart. No matter how often Mycroft tried to teach his brother to disconnect his mind from his brain from his heart it would never work. Sherlock's heart was mostly the reason why he was gone for two years. John Watson was the person who helped to defrost his brother's heart. Mycroft didn't know if he should thank John or scold him. The way he looked at it was that John did help to save his brother from his path of destruction, but he did also help cause it. John was his brother's pressure point and he was the main reason why his brother fell.

He did envy John as well. Even though he didn't think of it often and he tried to push the thought to the back of his mind. Often he did wish that he had the same relationship with Sherlock as John had with his brother. When that longing came it quickly left as he would replay his mantra of 'caring is not an advantage.' If John had been Sherlock's brother instead, Mycroft instantly knew that his brother would of have had a better life. John would actually showed that he cared and he had this unspoken strength that radiated off him and people were instantly calmer when he approached him. Mycroft did wonder how he had that effect on people, it wasn't as if he was going to learn the skill but he wanted to placate his curiosity. With his meetings with John he was tempted to ask about how he did it. But John most likely didn't know how he had that effect on people. Despite everything John was, he was still another goldfish in the world.

Despite everything he had taught his brother and all the things he had done for him, Mycroft knew that he was a horrible brother. He thought his only redemption as a brother was when his brother had ran away from home, Mycroft spend days wandering around the streets on his cameras and in person looking for his brother. When he did find Sherlock, he held him for hours on the wet ground, even though it ruined his suit, he kept repeating the same thing over and over to him: 'You are loved.' Mycroft did admit that he was rather out of character when he said that, but he couldn't care, his brother could have been dead and Mycroft knew that the loss off his brother would break his heart. Even though that Mycroft liked to think that he didn't have a heart, but that was far from the truth. Just as John was his brother's heart, Sherlock was his heart. Mycroft knew that the death of Grandfather affected him in a way that he couldn't describe, but it did make him have a fondness of carrying around umbrellas. But when it came to the thought of the possible death of his brother, he couldn't think about how he would react to it. Would he be like Grandfather and stare at a pictures? Would he carry something that helped him to remember his brother? He knew that his brother was going to die one day, due to the fact that his brother was an idiot and did stupid things so he would look clever. When he was younger, he didn't want this brother to get older as even though he was jealous of his brother half of the time, he did like him being all small and childlike even though he would try to act like an adult and would seem more childlike than ever. But then the day came when Sherlock wasn't really his 'little' brother anymore, as by age fourteen Sherlock was a head taller than him, also he had grown up from his childhood quirks and settled into a dark period filled with drink and drugs and didn't come out from its grasp for nine years of struggle. Despite his brother not being so little anymore, Mycroft would always look at his brother as being a little boy. He didn't know why he kept seeing his brother as being younger; he thought that it was due to the fact that Sherlock's eyes made him look rather vulnerable. Just as his own eyes 'looked sad', his brother's showed his vulnerability.

His brother's eyes were the main reason he kept watching him over camera. About every week he would try to get new cameras installed into Baker Street and his brother would find them quickly. But when his brother was at a low point and addiction was beckoning him, Sherlock would look into a camera and when Mycroft saw his eyes, he knew that it was time to at least talk to his brother and try to help to beat away the temptations. He didn't want his brother to go missing again or go back to using and when Sherlock had ran away, it was the most scared Mycroft had ever been in his life, it made him feel the emotions of fear and anxiety that he had locked away for years. Once Sherlock had gone home from being on the streets, Mycroft installed thirty cameras in the family home, just to make sure that he knew what his brother was doing and he was safe. Mycroft knew that he was being over protective and he was acting worse than mother, but he felt that he needed to. His parents weren't always going to be around and someone needed to look after Sherlock. Then John Watson came in to Sherlock's life and he stayed. After John stayed with Sherlock, the cameras slowly got removed from Baker Street. Apart from his brother, John was the second person who Mycroft felt he could trust, it must have been that John was a doctor and they are paid to be trusting, that's how they got their job done. Even though that most of the cameras were removed, Mycroft was still constantly worried for his brother , it took hours of convincing from John to remove the cameras on the agreement that if something happened to his brother, John would call him first. And being true to his word John did that.

Sitting at his office Mycroft couldn't help but smile at his brother and John go about their daily lives in the flat. It wasn't the most exciting thing to do and Mycroft knew that he was using his powers a the 'British Government' incorrectly but he didn't care. He only cared that his brother was safe and that was his main priority in life, but it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle over his emotions and his constant fear and jealousy over his brother was not finished, and it would only end when he died and he couldn't promise that. But one day it would end and everything would be alright, hopefully.


End file.
